The Renegades of Pern (1989)

Runs concurrently with the events in The White Dragon ( )

There she goes again. This is just the first three books told from a dozen other points of view. To begin with the many different points of view (which don't merge until somewhere around the middle of the book) was a bit disjointed and irritating to me. It took me a long time to get interested in the story at all and nearly just stopped reading the series all together. In the end I didn't hate it, but it is for SURE my least favorite. ( )

McCaffrey shifts her focus from dragonriders, harpers and lord holders to the other people who live on Pern and are affected by Thread. The book covers a longer time span: it starts around the same time as "Dragonflight" and ends a bit after the end of "The White Dragon". Many events in those books are revisited in other books through the experiences of the newly introduced characters. The book gives more depth to some of the conflicts in the previous books. It also reinforces the turn to science fiction, with more discoveries of the technology of the original settlers. It was good enough that I was happy to stick w/ the series, advancing to the next book, "All the Weyrs of Pern". ( )

This was one of the slowest of the Pern series and took a really long time to get into. I think in this case Anne McCaffrey didn't do as well with her style of jumping around in the time stream. This book seems to cover too much time and contained too many gaps that left me wondering what was going on more often that I would like. I didn't read the book very much though especially the exploration of the southern continent and how the new characters and their story lines connected too old characters and storylines. ( )

Another great Pern saga.

From Publishers Weekly:
While recent tales of Pern have dealt with early eras on that turbulent planet, this one begins during the time of Dragonquest and continues beyond the closing of The White Dragon, focusing on some of the commoners, and how they cope with the return of the life-consuming Thread. A number of lives intertwine, such as that of the trader boy Jayge Lilcamp, whose family is almost destroyed when his father refuses to believe the first Thread warning. Jayge runs afoul of Thella, sister of the Telgar Hold lord but a malcontent and leader of renegades, when she tries to kidnap the refugee girl Aramina, who can hear all dragons. Meanwhile, in the South, the young harper Piemur finds his destiny, and Toric, the first Holder there, schemes for supremacy. McCaffrey paints her colorful world on a still larger canvas, maintaining the complex plots and strong characterization that permeate her work. ( )